Daniel Clough

One dude. Seven foundational health habits.

Articles

I made working on my mindset my number one priority – here’s what happened.

About 18 months ago, I faced a cold, hard truth about myself – my mindset was holding me back.

I had this moment where it really clicked for me – this can’t go on. If I didn’t address it, I would be left with some serious regrets in life.

Since then, I’ve made working on my mindset one of my highest priorities. I’ve tried a lot of things, including all of the usual advice. I’ve taken courses, read books, done exercises and talked to a therapist. Sure, they helped lift me in the moment, but if I’m brutally honest – they didn’t make a lasting difference.

And that sort of led me to a depressing conclusion. Perhaps I’m hardwired to having this type of mindset? Luckily, I can’t accept that. Even so, I’d be lying if I told you I didn’t think that from time to time.

I’m in absolute awe of people like Jesse Itzler and Gary Vaynerchuk. They are full of optimism and confidence. But, I suspect this comes naturally to them. I struggle to see how I can reach anywhere near their level of confidence and mental toughness. I’ve come to realise that I will probably always have periods where I feel high, and periods where I feel low.

What I found instead, is a few strategies that really, really helped me improve and manage my mindset. They have helped me have more self awareness, and better manage the highs and lows. I may never have the confidence and mental toughness of Gary Vee. But, that doesn’t mean I need to accept that my mindset will hold me back from reaching my potential.

Before I share these strategies, I want to give a bit of background so you can understand where I am coming from.

I suffer with self doubt and anxiety, and I go through periods where I feel low, and it’s a real struggle to be optimistic.

I like to think I’m an organised and effective person. I’m very clear about what’s important to me, and I know how to get stuff done. But, my fragile mindset means I’m working with a very shaky foundation. It can blow apart my organised and productive world in an instant.

At times, I can feel on top of the world. When I feel like this, I am SO sure of my capability. I want to 10X my life, and I know it’s totally possible.

And then in a flash, it can come tumbling down.

One trigger can be seeing someone working hard in a low paying job. How on earth is that fair? Who am I to be in such a privileged position to be able to do big and interesting things, and get paid well for it? I get caught in a rut of imposter self talk, and I question the point in everything.

Another trigger can be something not going well enough at work (usually based on the ridiculously high expectations I have of myself). I start to question the point of me even being there? Surely there is someone else out there that could have done better, and should be doing my job instead?

Now, to be clear – I do always pull myself out of these moments. Sometimes I get back on track very quickly, but other times it takes days or weeks. But, I always do pull myself back on track. But goddammit, my life would be so much easier if I wasn’t pulled back by my mindset. I would do so many more great things.

So, as I said, I made working on my mindset a priority. It’s now one of a handful of key areas of my life I focus on – often the highest priority. I’ve established a few key questions that I ask myself at least weekly:

  • Am I developing an optimistic and positive mindset – where I see life as full of opportunity?
  • Am I pushing myself to feel confident and good enough? Where I feel capable of doing whatever I put my mind to?
  • Am I questioning beliefs that hold me back, and trying to overcome them?

These questions have helped me stay focused on improving my mindset.
So, let’s dive into the strategies. Here are three strategies that help me to feel good, and stay in the ‘high’ periods for as long as possible:

Look after myself

OK, OK, I know you’ve probably heard this before – as had I. But, for a long while it didn’t click for me just how important this. It only hit home when I started to notice the correlation between when I looked after myself, and when I didn’t.

It comes down to three things:

  • Drink very little or no alcohol.
  • Get enough sleep.
  • Exercise.

When I do all three, I tend to feel great about myself. And when I let at least two of them slip, I notice an immediate increase in anxiety and self doubt. This is a clear starting signal for a low period.

And of course, they are all connected. Drink too much alcohol, and you get rubbish sleep. Get rubbish sleep, and you’re less likely to want to exercise.

I say it in that order, because for me, reducing my alcohol consumption has been the game changer. I’ve cut back from two bottles of wine over the weekend. Now, I drink no more than two glasses over the weekend – and no more than one per night.

I’m hyper aware of these three things now. To the point where if I have a couple of nights of bad sleep, it’s on my radar to not let this extend to three or four nights. Because if it does, I know I’m at higher risk of a low period setting in.

Be in a positive feedback loop

This has been crucial for me. When I’m feeling good about myself, I’m almost always in a positive feedback loop. It’s really important for me to have regular feedback and evidence that I am good enough and capable.

And that doesn’t mean people actually giving me the feedback (although of course that’s always nice to hear). I get my positive feedback loop from seeing my impact. It reminds me that I am able to solve hard problems, and be useful – often in a way that many other people can’t.

When I’m going through a low period, there isn’t alot of tangible evidence of impact. That means my self doubt is much more likely to set in.

So, how do I influence that?

Well, firstly, I’m super picky about where I work nowadays. I need to be in an environment where I can be successful. That means working on things I am good at. Where there are enough hard problems to solve. And, having the autonomy to make a difference.

And then it’s a matter of being focused, and working on the right things.

A combination of the above usually means I can consistently make an impact, and be in a positive feedback loop.

Surround myself with positive people

This makes a world of difference. I need people around me that have energy and ambition. People who are positive and optimistic. People who are confident and take risks.

These people inspire me, and their personalities rub off on me. I’ve found I’m far less likely to dip when I’m regularly around people like this. I have more confidence.

I have a bunch of people like this both at work, and outside of work nowadays. And I follow a few people online who are great role models for being mentally tough. I listen to the Gary Vaynerchuk podcast almost daily. I follow Jesse Itzler and David Goggins through their Instagram accounts. And I listen to Ben Bergeron’s YouTube channel.

It’s pretty obvious really. If you want to change yourself, it makes sense to surround yourself with people who are more like you want to be.

The above three things have made a massive difference to how I feel about myself. I think about them on a weekly basis.

That said, I have to be realistic. I will still find myself in a period of feeling low from time to time. Here are three strategies I’ve found super useful to manage these low periods:

1. Accept it for what it is

It is what it is. I can do everything I can to avoid a low period, but sometimes I will find myself in one.

You have to be OK with it, and accept it. Every low period I’ve ever had, has always passed. This one will be no different. When you have enough self awareness for where you are, you can start to calmly work your way out of it

2. Reduce the expectations you have for yourself

It just stands to reason. If you’re not on your A game, don’t continue to hold yourself to the same expectations.

I used to try and power through regardless, and I only became more frustrated. Now, I temporarily reduce the expectations I have for myself. I do this across the board – with my work, my family, my health, etc. I scale things back to the minimum. I’m OK with going through the motions for a week or two. Trust me, nothing will fall apart. It’s unlikely that anyone will ever notice that your foot is temporarily off the gas. It all averages out in the end.

The key is to give yourself some space and the right environment to get back on track.

3. Fix what’s off

The strategies that help me to feel good – work so well. So much so, that I usually I find that when I go back to them, one or more of them is obviously off.

I may have neglected to look after myself. Perhaps I lost focus on work, and got distracted working on the wrong things – and I got out of the positive feedback loop. Or, I haven’t had the right people around me enough.

By fixing what’s off, I usually find I get back on track pretty quickly.

And that’s where I’m at right now with everything mindset. I feel for the first time, I’m actually able to keep the low periods to a minimum, and manage myself when I get into one.

From here, I’m going to continue to explore how I can get closer to the likes of the people I surround myself by. That’s the next level.

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Two proven ways to get important work done

It might be the most important thing you ever have to figure out for yourself. How do you get important work done?

It’s the key to living a full, productive, happy and balanced life. When you don’t have this figured out, you end up doing a lot of things, but actually achieving very little.

It looks like this:

The holy grail is spending most of your time in quadrants 1 and 2 (important work). And you want to be spending as little time in quadrants 3 and 4 (not important work).

Sounds obvious right? Well, it’s actually super fucking hard. It’s almost as if life is full of temptations that drag you into quadrants 3 and 4. Even worse, it has a way of tricking you into thinking you’re working on quadrants 1 and 2, when in fact you’re procrastinating in quadrants 3 and 4.

Ever convinced yourself that re-organising your google docs was important and necessary work? Well, you know where I’m coming from. 😉

Now, I want to be clear. I’m not claiming to be some type of rockstar that spends all my time in quadrants 1 and 2. I struggle like everyone else. I constantly wrestle with the temptations to put off important work. And I don’t always win.

That said, I have found two strategies that help me get important work done:

Plan your weeks and days

Jeeeeez. When are you going to stop writing about weekly and daily planning? Never ;-). That’s because I think it’s the most important thing we can do to get important work done.

If you’re going to have a chance of spending time in quadrants 1 and 2, you have to be intentional about where you spend your time. You have to carve out time to think about what work is actually important, and when you will do it. This puts you in control over your life.

I’m not going to cover how to plan your weeks and days, because I’ve done that before. Here are a couple of useful reads:

Create some space

This is how you can edge into quadrant 2 (important, not urgent work).

You don’t want a back to back schedule, where you’re rushing from one thing to the next. When I see my calendar starting to look like that, I get super worried and fix it.

You need to carve out space where you’re not doing anything. Ideally you never want to be more than 50% committed. That gives you a bit of space for important and urgent things that inevitably pop up. Importantly, it gives you space to think properly about things.

It’s in these spaces, that my brain starts to wonder about things a bit further down the line. This is literally the definition of quadrant 2 (important, but not urgent). And in this space, you can either take action on these items, or at least queue up action for the near future.

You’ll notice that the above two strategies are connected. Getting my calendar straight is a key component to planning my weeks and days. It’s the perfect time to ensure you carve out space to think about things properly.

Lastly, I want to give credit to these brilliant blog posts on ‘Wait But Why’. They really helped me with how I think about procrastination:

Why Procrastinators Procrastinate (Part 1)
How To Beat Procrastination (Part 2)
The Procrastination Matrix

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How to get back on track

When I woke up this morning, I found myself worrying about where I was in life.

It’s been a chaotic few months. We had a family holiday in Yorkshire. We’ve been doing a major house renovation, where we had to move out for 6 weeks. We moved back in now, but we’re still living in a partial building site. My daughter Fearne started school. And, I’m holding down a fairly ‘full on’ job in London.

I’ve found it a struggle to get, and stay in my groove. My environment has been all over the place, which makes it hard to stick to my habits and routines. It’s a reminder that these habits and routines are the foundation for how I organise my life and get things done.

As I sat there worrying and beating myself up, I remembered two things – which helped knock me out of it.

I need to be kind to myself and show self compassion.

There are valid reasons why I’m not in my groove. I need to lower the expectations I have of myself temporarily. Beating myself up will only hold me back from making a change.

I need to let go of the macro.

It’s not useful to focus on the big picture when I’m feeling like this. It can only make me feel bad and anxious. Instead, I need to switch to the now – today. What can I do today to put a step forward in the right direction? And then build on top of that. I can feel the pressure and anxiety start to fade, when I think about it like this.

Most of the time when I get into a state like this, it’s because I’m thinking too much about the future. It’s why I let go of goals a long time ago. On balance, I think they’re more harmful than useful. It’s much better to have broad (and non specific) focuses, and let go of the expectations.

So, I switch my focus. I stop worrying about where I should be, and where I am. I have 17 or so hours in front of me today, and I have a choice. I can either put a big step forward, I can stay where I am, or worse – go backwards.

I start to map out my day. When and how I will eat. Walk 10K steps and put in some mobility work. A call to connect with a friend that I haven’t spoken to for a while. Write something (this post). Read something. Some time to connect with Ella. Go to bed early, so I can wake early tomorrow and feel rested.

I try and keep it simple. The fewest things I can do, that will make an impact and make me feel better.

I ask myself how I will feel at the end of the day if I did these things? Happy that I took the first step to get back on track, and also that I put myself in a good position to tackle tomorrow. Nothing earth shattering – just a good step forward. And that’s what I need right now.

This is a good strategy for getting out of a funk. It’s also a good strategy for being happier in general.

It’s useful to think about the future and have expectations of yourself. But, it’s also easy to fall into the trap of spending too much time on it, and trying to be too specific about it.

Ultimately, you have today in front of you. You are in full control of what you make of it. Put a good step forward, and be happy about that. And then repeat. When you do this, the future will take care of itself.

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Mr Shitty Mindset (and four ways to beat him)

A couple of weekends ago, I had the most awesome Sunday roast dinner. I over-indulged, and that was fine – I felt great and I’d earned it.

But, things could have been very different. Let’s rewind back a few hours…

I was pacing the house, with a major self talk situation going on. I had a workout ahead of me, which I knew was going to be hard and feel horrible.

At this point, I hadn’t put my gym gear on yet.

‘Don’t bother’ said my shitty mindset. ‘It’s Sunday, and you’ve had a long, hard week. You deserve a rest. Go lay on the sofa and relax. Maybe even take a nap? Then, hit a workout tomorrow instead. You’ll be fresher and will do even better’

It was so tempting to jump on the sofa. But, instead, I jumped to a different type of self talk:

‘How will I feel at the end of the day, if I skip the workout?’

Pretty crap about myself. I’ll feel like I chose to stagnate, or go a step backwards. I will almost certainly feel guilty about eating a big Sunday roast dinner. I’ll know I took the easy route and let myself down. Also, I know from experience – this feeling will carry through into next week.

‘How will I feel at the end of the day, if I do the workout?’

I will feel disciplined and proud of myself. I’ll feel positive and will have more energy. I’ll feel like I took a decent step forward. And I’ll be able to sit down and enjoy the Sunday roast dinner, without an ounce of guilt.

That was enough for me. Before Mr Shitty mindset could convince me otherwise, on went the shorts and gym shoes. I quickly walked over to the garage (I have a home gym thing going on).

1–nil to me.

OK, So, here’s the plan:

10 rounds (every 2 minutes, on the minute).

  • 10 air squats
  • 10 push ups
  • 5 burpees

Followed by:

5 x 5 minute rounds on the Rogue Echo bike (5 mins rest between each round)

Each 5 minute round, is done in intervals of:

  • 45 secs (moderate pace)
  • 15 secs (fast pace)

In total, just over an hour of hard conditioning work. I know it will feel horrible. I tell myself:

‘Just put your head down and push through it – get it done.’

I kick off with the 10 rounds of squats, push ups and burpees. By the time I complete the 10 rounds (total of 20 mins), I’m on the floor breathing super hard.

On cue, Mr Shitty mindset shows up again.

‘Now, that was a great workout. You pushed really hard. You can feel proud of that effort. Look, it’s perfectly fine to stop there. I mean, imagine how horrible the bike is going to feel – especially with how you’re feeling now? Sometimes you do that bike workout as a workout of its own! So, it’s completely justified to stop here, and still feel good about what you did. Don’t over do it. Don’t put yourself through another 45 mins of really hard work. It’s going to feel horrible – you know it is.’

Again, another compelling argument. That’s the frustrating thing about Mr Shitty mindset – he can make a good case. I really do hate the feeling of that goddamn bike. I’m so close to wrapping up the workout and calling it a day there.

But, then I think about….

It’ll be a hell of a workout. It’s quite a bit more volume than I usually do. I’ll feel like I tapped into an extra reserve and completed what I’m truly capable of – instead of stopping at the first point of feeling uncomfortable. It’s what David Goggins would do.

‘How will I feel at the end of the day, if I skip the bike workout and finish here?

I’ll kick myself later, because I will know I stopped short of what I was capable of. I’ll feel like I choose to tread water, rather than take a step forward. And, the fact that I lacked the grit to push through the full workout – it will eat away at me for the next few days. Oh, and I won’t enjoy that Sunday dinner as much!

‘How will I feel at the end of the day, if I do the bike workout?’

Before I could think much more about it, I put on Still Dre, and jumped on the bike for the first round.

Phew. 2–nil to me.

I’m on my third round on the bike. This is feeling both horrible and good. If you’ve ever used an air assault bike, you’ll know what I mean.

Oh, Hi, Mr Shitty mindset. I figure you’re going to try and talk me out of rounds 4 and 5 right?

‘Come on, you know I make sense… Look, you ignored me and did the bike anyway. Fine. But, 3 rounds is enough. Let’s stop this nonsense. Why are you putting yourself through this? Feels horrible right? Trust me, rounds 4 and 5 are going to be far worse. Remember when you used to do only 3 rounds of the bike for a whole workout? Now, you’ve done it after the 10 rounds of squats, push ups and burpees. That’s more than enough. You don’t need to do more. You can stop here, and still feel great. Imagine not having to feeling horrible again on that bike?

I was so close to stopping after round 3 on the bike. At some point during round 3, I actually made the decision to stop after the third round. But, I quickly got focused on….

‘How will I feel at the end of the day, if I stop the bike after 3 rounds?

I’ll feel like I quit just before the end. I overcame Mr Shitty mindset talking me out of working out in the first place, and chipping away at getting me to do as little as possible throughout. But, then I will let myself be beaten by him in the last stretch??

‘How will I feel at the end of the day, if I finished 5 rounds of the bike?

On top of the WORLD. I know exactly what it feels to have a super hard workout under my belt, knowing it’s banked. I love that feeling. I’ll have set a new benchmark for what I’m capable of pushing through. And, I’ll be able to relax for the rest of the day and smash that Sunday lunch – guilt free. It’s only 15 mins away. You got this.

And with that, I jump back on the bike for round 4.

3–nil to me.

Mr Shitty mindset doesn’t even try and talk me out of rounds 4 and 5. He knows there’s no point – I have the finish line in sight.

I jump off the bike after round 5, and lay on the floor for a good 5 minutes. What a feeling. I hate working out, but I love working out!

I walk back in the house, shower, and put on some fresh clothes. I feel proud, relaxed and super happy. Next up – get making that Sunday dinner!

As I sit here writing this, it sinks in just how big a part of my life Mr Shitty mindset is. I have multiple conversations with him every day. But, it doesn’t always play out like it did above. He’s pretty good at what he does.

I suspect I’m not alone in this, and that most of us struggle with this type of self talk.

Here are four ways I’ve found useful to beat Mr Shitty mindset:

1. Be conscious that it’s happening

I would guess that at least half the time, this self talk plays a big role in causing us to procrastinate, or take the easy way out.

Half the battle is consciously noticing when this self talk is happening. When you do that, you can choose to take a step back and address it. There’s no special tricks to this. All you have to do is be more mindful and self aware when in these situations.

2. Give it a name

I think of this self talk as being a persona called ‘Mr Shitty mindset’. If you give it a name, it feels like more of a real thing to deal with. It also helps you notice when it shows up.

3. Disrupt the pattern

Sometimes it can be as simple as disrupting what’s going on. Now and again, I’ll find My Shitty mindset shows up and starts questioning my values or goals. This is no exaggeration…. Literally, within a few minutes I can find myself questioning what the point of my job is. Or, why I even bother working out. Or, starting to convince myself that a personal project I’m working on is useless, silly and insignificant etc.

When this happens, I find it useful to disrupt what’s going on. I find something completely different to focus my attention on. Sometimes, all it takes is striking up a conversation with someone. Or, jumping into a task. Whatever it takes to get out of your own head, and focused on something else.

When Mr Shitty mindset shows up, and you notice him, the two questions above really help.

4. Use the two questions

I imagine how I will feel at the end of the day if I give into him, and choose to procrastinate or take the easy way out. And then I think about how I will feel if instead, I choose to do the right ( often hard) thing.

The trick is to then act immediately towards doing the right thing. If you hesitate, he has his hooks into you again. Once you take the first step, you’ve usually won.

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This single book, restored my faith in books

I just finished reading Living with a Seal, and it was SO GOOD. Potentially life changing.

I’ve already sent a few copies to friends, and I’ve recommended it to more than ten people (this is very rare for me).

I’ve drifted away from reading books recently. I’m just so bored with them. I read half as many in 2019, then I did in 2018.

I feel most books should be an essay. In fact, I’m convinced most books become books, because someone wanted to write a book. Either a core idea expanded (usually through repetition) to fit the size of a book. Or too many ideas, and they never really get round to making a succinct point.

Living with a Seal has been sitting on my kindle for a while. And I figured I would give it a shot. I’m glad I did.

Jesse Itzler is a former rapper and highly successful entrepreneur. David Goggins is an accomplished Navy SEAL, world class ultra athlete and overall badass. Jesse hired Goggins to live and train with him for a month.

The only condition? Jesse had to do anything Goggins told him to do.

They ran through snow storms. They ran 4 miles every 4 hours for 48 hours. They did 1,000 burpees in a day (well, Goggins did over 2,000). They jumped into a frozen lake (more than once).

It’s one of those books that doesn’t feel like it’s trying hard to teach you something. But, it’s actually teaching you a ton.

It’s a story about the power of mindset and discipline. The scope of human potential. The importance of learning to live with, and lean into discomfort. How to notice what’s bullshit, and focus on what’s important. And it’s hilarious.

I finished the book yesterday. This morning I got up and I felt different. I felt more capable and in control. My first instinct was definitely not to run 2 miles and do 50 push ups and 50 burpees. But, it sort of crept up on me, so I did exactly that.

It’s also a reminder for me that mindset trumps everything else. A shitty mindset will work directly against you. I struggle with this at times, and it’s a fresh reminder for me to double down in this area.

We can’t all be David Goggins (and we may not want to be). But I have a feeling this book will strike a nerve with you, and push your life into a better direction. It has mine.

Let me know what you think.

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What great operators have in common

I’ve worked with some great operators over the last 20 years. And there seems to be a common thread amongst them.

It comes down to how they’re able to think across three different time frames. Importantly, how they’re able to perfectly balance the time they spend in each of these time frames.

Inversely, bad operators tend to spend their time almost exclusively in just one of these time frames. Either that, or they don’t balance the time they spend in each one very well.

The three time frames are:

Now

This is what’s right in front of you. It’s your immediate goal and priorities. Usually it’s about 4-8 weeks in front of you.

One step ahead

This is the logical phase or set of priorities that come after what’s right in front of you. It’s what you’ll need to start working on, once you’ve nailed what’s immediately in front of you.

The end goal

This is what you’re ultimately working towards. It’s what success looks like over the long term.

Great operators tend to perfectly balance the time they spend in each of these three time frames.

They start by thinking about the end goal. They get clear on what they’re trying to achieve over the long term. This means that they can push forward with a clear purpose and direction. Not doing this, is almost the definition of being unstrategic.

But, they don’t get too caught up trying to lock down the end goal in fine detail. They know it will change as they work towards it. They do enough, to have a clear sense for where to head – and then they step back from it.

After that, they spend most of their time in the now. They get on with their immediate goals and priorities. The things that need to be done this week, and next week. They start building momentum.

Here is the tricky part. They have to get stuff done, but in parallel to that, they also need to have an eye on what comes next (one step ahead). They will do preparation work, so that they can seamlessly transition into the next logical goal or phase of work. When this isn’t done, you risk completing what’s in front of you, but then being unprepared for what comes next. This causes you to lose time and momentum.

Last of all, they take a step back from time to time, to think about the end goal. They think about what they’ve learned from completing what’s in front of them – and from planning for the next logical goal or phase of work. The end goal is re-shaped if necessary. What they don’t do, is get too stuck thinking about the end goal. They get back to what’s in front of them.

As you can see, it’s a tricky balance to keep these three time frames in your head.

You probably need to spend 70% of your time working on what’s in front of you (now). In parallel to that, you’re probably spending 20% of your time planning for the next logical goal or phase of work (one step ahead). And then roughly 10% of your time is spent taking a step back and thinking about where you’re heading (the end goal).

This is what good execution looks like. Great operators will naturally think like this. They don’t miss a beat.

What you’ll also notice, is that great leaders and managers do this with their teams. They develop a vision for the team to work towards. They help them focus on what’s in front of them, but also encourage them to plan for what’s around the corner.

Common Operating Mistakes

Problems arise when people spend their time almost exclusively in one of the time frames. Either that, or they don’t balance the time they spend in each one very well.

For example, let’s look at spending your time almost exclusively in one of the time frames. Let’s say, all you think about is the now. Sure, it will look like you’re getting stuff done – but in reality, it’s a random effort. You’ll lack a clear direction, and will often get surprised by things that are one step ahead. Rarely does this result in impactful or transformative work.

Another good example is spending too much time thinking about the end goal. It becomes paralysing, and you never really get into execution mode.

The other mistake, is not balancing the time you spend in each one very well. For example, you might start to work on the now, but then become too distracted by worrying about what comes next. Or you worry too much about what the end goal should perfectly look like. This also becomes paralysing and gets in the way of execution.

A recent example

To help give some context, here’s a recent example of having to think like this.

I joined Bossa Studios earlier this year. One of the things on my radar was recruitment.

We were doing some things well, but we were also doing a bunch of things not so well. Overall, we weren’t in a great place.

First up, we had to spend some time thinking about what the end goal looked like. Where did we need to ultimately get to?

We needed to work towards a strategic, and approved hiring plan. We needed a people and talent team who had the capability and capacity to source and hire great candidates. And we needed a robust hiring process, from beginning to end.

That was enough for me. It was clear what the end goal was.

Then we had to switch to the now. We knew the foundation would be having a strategic, and approved hiring plan. This would drive all of our work. So, we got to work on building this with the senior leadership team.

It took about 6-8 weeks, but we finally got there. We had in front of us a strategic, and approved hiring plan (many of the roles are live here). We also established an approval process for any new hires. This would keep the hiring plan tight.

In parallel to this work, we had to have our eyes on what would come next (one step ahead). We knew that once the hiring plan was in place, we would need to execute against it – and pretty quickly. We didn’t have the team or process to be able to do that well enough.

So, whilst we were building the hiring plan, we overhauled our recruitment process. We also started to build out the people and talent team. We made two very strong hires. A permanent senior people manager, and a fixed term recruiter.

If we were 100% focused on the hiring plan, we’d have been screwed at the end of it. We would have a nice hiring plan in front of us, but no chance of being able to execute it.

Now, I’d love to say we seamlessly transitioned into executing on the hiring plan. Things rarely go that perfect 😉

Whilst we made two very strong hires in the people and talent team, they aren’t due to start until August. So, we’ve been incredibly stretched for the last 4-6 weeks executing on the hiring plan the best we can. It’s messy in places, but we’re keeping our head above water and I’m proud of that. Luckily, we’re not far from those two key hires joining us, and things settling down.

We already have our eye on what’s next too. It’s great we have a hiring plan, and soon a team capable of executing it. But, now we need to focus on significantly strengthening our candidate pipeline. We’ve done some prep work for this already, but need to double down on it over the coming months.

As you can see, it’s a constant balancing act of the three time frames. You have to mostly focus on what’s in front of you, but also spend some time planning for what’s around the corner. And from time to time, you have to take a step back and think about the end goal.

When you do that, the results tend to flow.

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How to be focused and effective at work

I recently started a new role at a Bossa Games Studio. This has meant I’ve had to get to grips with some strategies and systems for being focused and effective at work again.

The good news is that I’ve accumulated them over the last twenty years, so they are coming back to me quickly. But, I’ve also noticed some new ways to think about things. I wanted to get them all out of my head, in case others find them useful.

A couple of things before I start.

Most of my background is working in leadership roles, so there is a bias towards managing managers. That said, most of these are applicable, or can be adapted for any situation.

It might also seem like a pretty heavyweight system. But, once you get the hang of some of these, they can be done quite quickly. Before you know it, they become second nature. I have no doubt, the time investment is a no brainer.

So, let’s get started.

The Six Month Plan

There will always be far more things to do, than you’re able to do. So, you need a direction and a strategy, to help you prioritise.

It’s worth taking the time to think carefully about what you want to achieve over the next six months. I tend to set aside the first 30 days in a new role for just two things – learn, and put together a six month plan. Anything extra is a bonus. I encourage anyone I hire to do exactly the same.

Six months is a decent time frame to plan ahead for. It’s long enough for a number of things to be done, and to measure your impact. But, it’s not too long that everything might change halfway through.

I try and have only a handful of priorities. Usually, a couple of big things that have the potential to be transformative – or at least build significant momentum towards something transformative. And then a few things that will be impactful, but on less of a scale.

For each of these priorities, I try and have a clear idea of where I want to be in six months time. This means I can gauge if I’m making enough progress towards it.

When you write your plan, try not to slip into detailed planning. The six month plan is for high level thinking, and prioritising. It’s about setting a direction and being clear on your priorities. My plans usually fit on one page, and they never go over two pages. Keep things high level and simple.

Get some feedback from a few people whose judgement you trust. This can be your peers, or anyone else in or outside of the organization. You should also discuss and get full buy-in from whoever you report into. It doesn’t matter what your level – if you show you’ve thought carefully about what you want to achieve in the future, and can articulate that succinctly, you’ll stand out above everyone else.

My six month plan then becomes my guiding light, and it drives my weekly planning and priorities. If I make good progress on these items by the end of the week – it was a good week.

I review and update the six month plan every quarter. Again, set some time aside to think carefully about this. Priorities will sometimes change and new opportunities will open up. It’s important to stay on top of it and keep your priorities relevant.

Weekly Planning

Every Sunday, I spend a couple of hours planning for the week ahead. It’s without doubt the most important thing I do.

When I don’t do it, I’m reactive and don’t make enough progress on important (but not urgent) things. I usually finish the week in a bit of a spin, and find it hard to put my finger on how useful I was.

But, when I do it, I’m super focused and organised through the week. My priorities are obvious and I stay focused on the most important things. As you can expect, it usually feels good to look back on those weeks.

I like to do my weekly planning at the weekend. I make sure I’m in a quiet space and can’t be interrupted. I always feel great afterwards, and super prepared for the following week.

Weekly Planning – Calendar

The first thing I do as part of my weekly planning is look at the calendar. I want to get a sense of how the week is looking, before I start to plan out what I want to do.

It’s usually filled with a mix of recurring meetings (management, 121’s and project specific) and a few other adhoc meetings. It starts off about 3/4 full. If I jumped into the week like that, it would be a car crash. I would get more meeting requests throughout the week, and I wouldn’t get enough time to think or focus on anything.

My goal is to pair it back to at least 1/2 full – but preferably 1/3 full. I want to see plenty of white space. That way, I know that when (not if) I get more meeting requests, I will still get 25% to 50% free time to work on a project or think.

There’s nothing fancy about my process. I just look for meetings that I don’t need to be in. Or, meetings that I can get away with pushing back one or two weeks. If you want to create enough free space, you have to be ruthless about this.

I will also have a specific focus for some of the days. For example, Monday is usually full of management and 121 meetings. This helps me get everything pointed in the right direction at the beginning of the week. Tuesday is usually some 121 hangover and some free time. Wednesdays is pretty free for focused work. Thursday for project meetings. etc.

I’m a sucker for colour coding. Management meetings, 121’s, project based meetings, interviews, focus blocks, commuting time etc. They all have their own colour codings. That way I can glance at my calendar and work out what types of things are going on.

When I have 25% to 50% free space, I will drop a few focus blocks in. These are meeting placeholders with myself, that last 2-3 hours. I title them ‘FOCUS BLOCK’. This protects some of my free space.

And that’s it. I’m left with a set of the highest priority meetings, dedicated focus blocks and some white space. From there, I can start to think about the weekly plan…

Weekly Planning – The Weekly Plan

You can probably tell by now – I kinda like plans. I make a plan each week for my personal life, and work is no different.

The first thing I do is open a large moleskin notepad and write out four headings:

  • Big. This is for things that will help me make progress on my six month plan. Or, anything else big and important that needs to be worked on.
  • Small. This is for everything else – all of the many small things you have to do that week.
  • People. This is for thinking about how I can build and strengthen relationships. It could be a lunch with a direct report. Sending an email to check in with someone. Popping over and saying hi and asking how things are going with someone. Thinking about ‘People’ as a thing, makes it less likely that you’ll go too long without checking in with someone.
  • Communication. This is for anything you need to communicate – either to groups or individuals. When you think about ‘communication’ as a thing, you operate entirely differently. You can go from a bad communicator, to a great communicator overnight – just by thinking about it as a thing each week. And this is very powerful. Alot of problems usually stem from a lack of communication.

I start by reviewing my 6 month plan. I look at what I need to do to move each thing forward. I make a note of those things under the ‘big’ heading.

Then I look at my to do list (more on this later) and make a note of things I want to do under either the ‘big’ or ‘small’ headings.

The ‘People’ and ‘Communication’ headings are a bit more fluid. I don’t have a plan or a ‘to do’ list that I pull from. I will just have a think about what feels right to do in the week – and then put down some ideas for that.

Once I’m happy with everything, I transfer it over to a google doc called ‘Weekly Plan’. So, I end up with the same list, under the same four headings.

There are three other headings I have in the ‘Weekly Plan’ doc that sit beneath these four headings – ‘Next Week’, ‘To Do’ and ‘Later’.

The ‘Next Week’ and ‘Later’ headings become relevant as soon as I transfer everything to the ‘Weekly Plan’ doc. I almost always find that I’ve been too ambitious and have too many things in my Weekly Plan. So, I look again at my priorities, and start to think about things I can push to next week. If I can push it back even further, it goes under ‘Later’. I keep doing this until my Weekly plan is realistic.

There’s something nice about being able to take something off your plate for the week, knowing it’s captured for next week’s planning.

I then take one last look at the weekly plan. I try and envisage what it would feel like to be at the end of the week, having actually done it. If I feel it would move things forward nicely, and would be a good week, I’m happy.

The last heading is ‘To Do’. It remains empty for the time being. But, it’s super useful for when the week gets started. As you move through the week, all sorts of new things will pop up. If they have to be done this week, I drop them into the ‘To Do’ list. That way, they’re captured for when I do my daily planning. If I can get away with not doing them this week, I will drop them under the ‘Next Week’ or ‘Later’ headings to get them out of my head.

I often find myself sending out emails to people when I write my weekly plan. This is because the process triggers things you need to set up, or remind people of. I’m still not sure if this is a good idea, because it takes you out of the rhythm of weekly planning.

On balance, I think it’s worth doing, otherwise it’s easy to forget. Be careful not to get lost in your inbox though. Get straight back to the weekly plan afterwards.

Weekly Planning – ‘To Discuss’ list

I always have a bunch of 121 meetings each week – either with my boss or my direct reports. I keep a notepad file called ‘to Discuss’ on my desktop with the name of each person as a heading.

When and as I think of things that I need to discuss with people, I jot it down under the appropriate person. This is useful for a couple of reasons. It means I’m not annoying people every time I think of something. And, it feels great to detach myself of something when it pops in my head.

Throughout the week, my ‘to discuss’ lists grow. When it comes to my 121 meetings, I have a nice list of things I can rattle through. It’s a super efficient way of having productive 121 meetings.

The Daily Plan

Every morning, I block out some time to plan the day out. Usually, I get in early so I can make the most of the peace and quiet. When I can’t do that, I will do it the night before, or on the train commute.

When and how you do it isn’t that important. The point is, never start the day without a plan. It’s no different to not making time to plan out your week. You’ll just get dragged into a reactive day, and you won’t spend enough time on the right things.

My daily planning process is straightforward and similar to my weekly planning process.

I start by looking at the calendar. It’s usually in pretty good shape because of the work I’ve done in my weekly planning. If anything needs re-arranging, I’ll do it. From there, I have a good sense of what meetings I’ll be in, and how much free time I have to focus on other things.

Then, I open a large moleskin notepad that I dedicate for my ‘Daily Planning’. I make four familiar headings – ‘Big’, ‘Small’, ‘People’ and ‘Communication’. I simply look at those four headings in my Weekly Plan and I decide what I’m going to do today. I also look at the ‘To Do’ heading in my Weekly Plan and do the same.

I do a quick check on whether it feels realistic to do these things. Then, I transfer it over to a notepad file on my desktop called ‘Today’. At this point, I lose the four headings and just have one big list of things to do that day.

I then organise it into two lists – ‘AM’ and ‘PM’ (morning and afternoon). Each list is prioritised. So, if I fail to get to the bottom, at least I will have tackled the highest priority ones.

And this settles as my to do list for the day.

Lastly, beneath the ‘AM’ and ‘PM’ lists, I have a heading call ‘Done’. When I get things done, I will cut and paste it under the ‘Done’ heading. For anyone that does this, you’ll know it feels good to get this sense of completion.

Email

I could be better at email, but I’m also not too bad.

To start with, I make sure I’m on very few distribution lists. I’m very strict about this. I end up only being on a few (usually an allstaff and a couple of management ones). This means that my inbox isn’t bombarded with new emails.

I know this is tough for some people. At first it feels you might miss out on something important. But, I would encourage you to try it. What you’ll find is that you don’t miss out on anything. And the 1% of stuff that is urgent, will find another way to float up to you.

This means that I reach inbox zero at the end of each day. I cringe when I see people with thousands of unread email. My mind would feel cluttered if I had that type of inbox

The thing I’m the worst at is batching. Checking emails constantly throughout the day is almost the definition of unfocused. I want to get to the point where I’m able to check emails in the morning, at lunch and late afternoon. Three times a day, that would be perfect. At the moment, I check it ten or so times a day, which I feel is too much. Definitely something to work on…..

Phew… And there we have it. That’s my full system for being organised. I hope some of it is useful and that you find a way to apply parts of it to what you do.

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Schedule every damn minute

When I woke up this morning, I knew exactly what to do:

  • Drink two glasses of water with my fish oil and multivitamin
  • GMB Elements workout
  • Mckenzie back exercises
  • Shower
  • Catch train (07.53)
  • etc. (you get the idea)

I knew exactly what to do because I sat down the night before and made a plan It started by looking at my google calendar. I wanted to know what hard commitments I had first.

Then, I made 3 lists:

  • big things (actions in areas of my life that are important to me at the moment)
  • small things (admin type stuff)
  • people (friends, family etc.)

If I knew when I wanted to do something, I made a note next to it (early, am, pm, eve or a specific time).

After making the lists, I realised I had too much (this happens quite a lot). So, I removed a few things, until I was left with what felt like a realistic number of things for a day.

OK, time to get specific. On the top line of a moleskin notepad page, I wrote the number 5. I continued this down to the bottom line of the page, ending at 22 (a new number every other line). Each line represents 30 mins – starting at 05.00 and ending at 22.00

Then, I started to block out time, and write specific things in those blocks.

For example, I blocked out the four lines that represent the two hour block 08.00 AM to 10.00AM with:

Catch train – 07.53
Write (on train)

After I finished, I had a well thought out and specific plan for the next day in front of me. Every damn minute scheduled. It had a nice balance – a good mix of big things that are important to me, smaller admin type things and people I need to connect with. I try and aim for that mix most days.

And that’s why when I woke up this morning, I knew exactly what to do. I didn’t have to waste an ounce of energy thinking about it. I just got started on the plan.

Discipline equals freedom

Jocko Willink popularised the saying ‘Discipline equals freedom’.

It’s a bit hard to get your head around at first – because on the surface, it’s counter-intuitive. But, when you know what it feels like to start the day in a prepared and intentional way, you start to understand what it means.

When you start the day like this, you start off on the right foot. There are no decisions to make. You start doing important things. and get an early wind of productivity. It’s incredible how that builds a momentum which carries through into the rest of the day. You spend more time on things that are important. There’s less reaction. You get more done. You’re in control. You’re happier.

Contrast that to how it feels to start the day in an unprepared way. You tend to start the day off with immediate decisions. You feel rushed and get dragged into things that feel urgent, but aren’t important (or at least, there are probably better and more important things to do). That builds its own kind of momentum and it sets a the tone for the day. You’re reactive. You’re sometimes left wondering what you really achieved that day. You’re probably not at your happiest.

You might think, it’s just one day. Can it really make such a big difference to attack it with intention and discipline? I think so.

Here’s the thing about discipline, habits and small steps – there’s often a compounding nature to them. And this delivers massive results over the long-term. This is true both personally and professionally.

It might not seem like a big deal to work out a few times a week. But, over a number of years, you end up with a decent level of health and fitness which makes a huge difference to your life. You’re less likely to get a chronic disease, you’re more likely to be active, you’re more likely to be a part of your children’s, and their children’s lives etc.).

Think of two people in similar professional roles. Imagine one arrives on time and just jumps into a simple to do list, whatever’s in the calendar or pops up. Now, imagine the other one attacks it with a well thought out, intentional and detailed plan. It might not seem like a big deal at the end of the day. But over a year, several years, or an entire career, the difference will be gigantic. In fact, it might be one of the easiest ways to gain a competitive advantage at work.

I would go as far to say that taking the time to plan your day is the single, biggest thing you can do to have a better life and career.

You might have noticed that I haven’t mentioned anything about establishing a direction for your life. Or anything about planning at a weekly level. Whilst these are both super important and impactful (and I do them), they’re not in the same league as a proper plan for the day.

In most cases, I would advise learning how to plan your day first, before doing the bigger thinking. This is because most of us have a general sense of what’s important to us if we take a few minutes to think about it. Looking after yourself and doing meaningful and focused work. Connecting with people you love etc. That gets you at least half the way there. From there, the bigger picture stuff just directs your actions.

So, yeah. I think planning your day is kind of a big deal 😉

Note: In case you’re wondering, I didn’t mention much about my work. That’s because I tend to think about my work and career as a contained area of my life. I have a separate planning process for planning my work day (which is quite similar).

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5 things I love (#3)

I put a lot of effort into curating my social media feeds, to discover great content. By great, I mean things that might spark an idea, and have potential to have a big impact on my life.

Below are five things I’ve read, listened to, or watched recently – that I think are really special:

1 – I loved the Joe Rogan Experience #1250 – Johann Hari podcast. Johann Hari is a writer and journalist on the topics of depression, addiction and the war on drugs.

Johann is a brilliant storyteller. You find yourself getting lost in his stories. The whole conversation is captivating. It persuaded me to pick up his book Lost Connections, which I’m reading at the moment.

2 – The Jim Collins — A Rare Interview with a Reclusive Polymath (#361) podcast is a straight up knowledge bomb drop.

I obviously knew who Jim Collins was, from having read Good to Great and Built to Last earlier in my career. They were such great books and helped shape my thinking around what makes a great company.

Tim does a great job of picking Jim’s brain. They cover how he does his research and develops concepts. There’s a ton of stuff around what makes him personally effective too. I particularly liked how he thinks about organising his time and life.

I’m definitely going to go back and re-read Good to Great and Built to Last over the next couple of months.

3 – Digital Minimalism is a new book by Cal Newport. He’s one of my favourite authors and Deep Work is one of my all time favourite books.

He writes about a lot of the type of stuff I write about here – just about 100 times better 😉

It’s a big wake up call for how technology is actually making our lives less connected and ultimately, worse. There are some great strategies and case studies for how to think about technology. Specifically how to use it in a way that truly makes life better. This is a must read for everyone.

4 – Naval Ravikant: The Angel Philosopher on Investing, Making Decisions, Happiness and the Meaning of Life (podcast) is another very dense conversation. It’s packed with smart advice on how to live a good life.

Naval Ravikant is the CEO and co-founder of AngelList. He’s invested in more than 100 companies, including Uber, Twitter, Yammer, and many others. He’s also a very deep thinker and has some really interesting views on life. What makes them so interesting, is that they are often counter-intuitive. In fact, I wrote a whole post on something he talked about, that resonated so deeply with me.

5 – FYRE: The Greatest Party That Never Happened is a documentary about the spectacular failure of the The Fyre Festival.

It ended up being the exact opposite of what it was advertised as – a luxury music experience on a posh private island.

The festival was co-founded by Billy McFarland, CEO of Fyre Media Inc, and rapper Ja Rule. How much of a disaster was it? Well, Billy McFarland is now spending six years in jail for fraud.

It almost feels like you’re watching a comedy. Luxury private villas (that never existed) ended up as disaster tents leftover from Hurricane Matthew. But, it’s also quite sad to see what feels like good employees trying to do good work in an impossible situation. They got caught in the spell of Billy McFarland’s charisma and lies.

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The hardest part about getting addictive behaviours under control

In how to win the battle with addictive behaviours, I outlined a three step process:

  1. Self awareness
  2. Do a Reset
  3. Decide the line

I’m not saying a reset is easy – it’s not. The first week of giving something up can be tough. But, most people can get through a 30 day reset if it’s important enough to them.

What I’m finding much harder is deciding the right line. You have to do some honest weighing up of the positives and negatives of the behaviour you’re trying to change. And you have to be realistic about where the right line is for you.

As I’ve said before, there isn’t usually a middle ground. The right line is probably closer to elimination. Whilst that narrows the gap, it’s still surprisingly tricky to get right.

I rarely get it right first time. I end up doing quite a bit of trial and error before I settle on what feels right.

After a reset period, I’ve come to realise there are three different ways to bring an addictive behaviour back into your life in a manageable way:

1. Eliminate it permanently

In some cases, it’s best to give it up forever.

This is usually the case when the negatives overwhelmingly outweigh the positives. Or, it’s a behaviour that you struggle to control.

Giving up Facebook is a good example for me. Upon deeper analysis I found no one single benefit that could convince me it was worth sticking with. The benefits I used to tell myself fell apart pretty quickly when I was honest with myself. I also had a big list of negatives. That was enough for me to give it up permanently. I’ve never felt an ounce of temptation to return.

2. Mostly give up – but do it once in a blue moon (with limits):

This is about as close to eliminating it as you can get. I find this is the best option when the positives and negatives are evenly balanced. Or, one of the negatives is so strong it’s hard to have it in your life on a frequent basis. It’s also a good option if you struggle to control the behaviour, even in a limited way.

I’ve only just realised that this is where alcohol best sits for me. After a reset, I tried to set weekly limits for myself. But even with those limits, I found the negatives were too powerful (poor sleep, less likely to wake early, less likely to exercise, less likely to plan the day, low mood etc.). I also find it too hard to stick to the limits I set myself, often going over them. This tipped the scales towards it being overall negative for me.

So now, by default, I don’t drink. I’m clear on my ‘once in a blue moon’ use cases and will always approach them with clear limits. I haven’t touched a drink in three weeks. It’s starting to get easier to consider myself a non drinker, who now and again has the odd drink on a special occasion.

3. Frequent use (with limits)

This is a good option if the positives mostly outweigh the negatives. It’s also a good option if you are confident you can be in control over the behaviour.

Caffeine is a good example for me. I cut my caffeine intake by roughly 90% since the beginning of the year.

I started off by setting a limit of one caffeine drink a day, always before midday.

I soon realised that a one caffeine drink per day limit was a bit too restrictive. I enjoy a cup of tea with my early morning routine – but I also enjoy one mid morning. The difference between one and two caffeine drinks per day isn’t significant to me. It doesn’t affect my results. So, I’ve settled on a limit of two caffeine drinks a day – always before midday.

Since I upped the limit, it feels much better. In fact, I probably still drink one cup about 50% of the time. I think that shows I’m well in control of the behaviour.

Some things will always be a struggle…

The above approaches work most of the time. But, I’ve found that some things always feel a bit of a struggle to get under control.

For me, that’s food. After doing a reset period (strict paleo), I decided permanently eliminating non paleo foods would be too hard to stick to. Plus, I wouldn’t be happy. For the same reasons, I also decided it would be too hard to mostly give up – but do it once in a blue moon. So, I settled on frequent use (with limits):

Mon – Fri:

  • Strict paleo eating (no wheat, dairy, legumes, sweeteners, chocolate, soft drinks or any processed foods)
  • Time restricted eating. Eat between 12PM – 8PM (8 hours) and fast between 8PM – 12PM (16 hours).

Weekends:

  • Ease up on strict paleo and time restricted eating. But, still make fairly sensible choices (avoid going overboard and pigging out).

Whilst I’m doing OK (in fact, better than I’ve ever done), I still have the odd slip up during the week. I also find it hard to resist a blow out at the weekend.

I don’t know why I have such a desire for bad food. It’s just something I have a temptation to over-indulge in. It’s gone on for a long time and I guess it’s something I’ll always struggle with. I’ll probably have to settle with being OK getting as close to the above limits as I can. That’s still pretty good and achieves most of my goals.

As you can see, I’ve found the reset step to actually be the easiest bit. There’s not a lot of thinking about it – you just have to put your head down and cut it out for 30 days.

Trying to work out where it should sit in your life after the reset is much harder. It requires honest analysis, good judgement and often quite a bit of trial and error. But, when you nail it – it feels great. You can’t beat being in full control, with most of the upside. That’s a great place to be.

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